The black-gray ceramic of every car-brake disc on a Porsche / Ferrari (the SiC-carbon ceramic-matrix composite brake), every high-power semiconductor switch (silicon-carbide MOSFETs in EV inverters, the technology that makes electric-vehicle drivetrains efficient), every body-armor ceramic plate, every grinding wheel, every Mohs-7-and-below abrasive paper. Silicon carbide (SiC, the chemistry; Carborundum, the Acheson trade name dating to 1891 (US patent 1893)) is the second-hardest commercial ceramic after diamond — Mohs hardness 9 — and one of the hardest substances in industrial use. The applications split between mechanical (abrasives, brakes, armor, bearings) and electronic (high-power semiconductors, the parallel material to silicon for wide-bandgap devices that operate at higher voltage and temperature than silicon allows). Manufacturing routes: sintered (highest performance, hardest to fabricate), reaction-bonded (lower-cost, somewhat lower performance), CVD (high-purity for semiconductor use). Buy from CoorsTek / Saint-Gobain for structural; from Wolfspeed / II-VI for semiconductor-grade.
Silicon-carbon covalent compound, chemistry SiC, multiple polytypes (the most common in industry are 6H-SiC and 4H-SiC for electronics, alpha-SiC for structural). Density 3210 kg/m³. Flexural strength 350-500 MPa (sintered). Compressive strength 3000+ MPa. Vickers hardness 2400-2800 HV (second only to diamond among industrial materials). Young's modulus 410-450 GPa (very high — half again steel's). Service temperature 1600 °C continuous in oxidizing atmosphere (a passivating SiO2 layer protects the SiC underneath up to that point), 2700 °C in inert atmosphere. Thermal conductivity 120-270 W/(m·K) (higher than steel, the property that makes SiC useful in high-power-electronics heat-sinks and in friction-brake heat dissipation). Wide bandgap (2.3-3.3 eV depending on polytype) supports power-electronic devices that operate at higher voltage / temperature / switching speed than silicon (silicon's bandgap is 1.12 eV) — the EV power-converter revolution rests on this property. Manufacturing: sintered SiC (uniaxial / isostatic pressing of fine powder + sintering at 2100 °C with sintering aids) for structural; reaction-bonded SiC (silicon infiltration of porous carbon-SiC preform) for cheaper structural; CVD SiC (chemical vapor deposition from silane + methane gases) for semiconductor wafer / coating use; carbon-fiber + SiC matrix composite (CMC) for brake discs (Brembo Carbon Ceramic Brake, Porsche PCCB).
Principled BSDF defaults derived from the sphere metallic finish. Reasonable seed for Blender, Substance, Keyshot, Rhino — tune per material. Or grab the whole library at once: ForMaterials library →
# finish: metallic albedo #1c1c1e metallic 0.30 roughness 0.55 ior 1.45 transmission 0.00 clearcoat 0.00 sheen 0.00 anisotropic 0.00
{
"albedo": "#1c1c1e",
"metallic": 0.3,
"roughness": 0.55,
"ior": 1.45,
"transmission": 0.0,
"clearcoat": 0.0,
"sheen": 0.0,
"anisotropic": 0.0
}
# Blender 4.x — Principled BSDF
# Silicon Carbide (SiC, Carborundum) · finish: metallic
import bpy
mat = bpy.data.materials.new(name="mat_silicon_carbide")
mat.use_nodes = True
bsdf = mat.node_tree.nodes["Principled BSDF"]
bsdf.inputs["Base Color"].default_value = (0.0116, 0.0116, 0.013, 1.0)
bsdf.inputs["Metallic"].default_value = 0.300
bsdf.inputs["Roughness"].default_value = 0.550
bsdf.inputs["IOR"].default_value = 1.450
bsdf.inputs["Transmission Weight"].default_value = 0.000
bsdf.inputs["Coat Weight"].default_value = 0.000
bsdf.inputs["Sheen Weight"].default_value = 0.000
bsdf.inputs["Anisotropic"].default_value = 0.000
# KeyShot 11+ — lux Python API, Generic material
# Silicon Carbide (SiC, Carborundum) · finish: metallic
# Run from Window → Scripting Console
import lux
mat = lux.createMaterial(name="mat_silicon_carbide", materialType="Generic")
mat.setProperty("diffuse", (28, 28, 30)) # 8-bit sRGB
mat.setProperty("metallic", 0.300)
mat.setProperty("roughness", 0.550)
mat.setProperty("indexOfRefraction", 1.450)
mat.setProperty("transparency", 0.000)
mat.setProperty("coatingWeight", 0.000)
{
"_format": "Substance Designer / Painter \u2014 pbrMetalRough constants",
"_about": "Silicon Carbide (SiC, Carborundum) \u00b7 finish: metallic",
"baseColor": {
"r": 0.0116,
"g": 0.0116,
"b": 0.013
},
"metallic": 0.3,
"roughness": 0.55,
"ior": 1.45,
"opacity": 1.0,
"anisotropyLevel": 0.0,
"_notes": "Channels listed are the standard Substance pbrMetalRough output. Drop into a Uniform Color node per channel, or as the constant input on a layered stack."
}{
"asset": {
"version": "2.0",
"generator": "ForMatter"
},
"materials": [
{
"name": "mat_silicon_carbide",
"pbrMetallicRoughness": {
"baseColorFactor": [
0.0116,
0.0116,
0.013,
1.0
],
"metallicFactor": 0.3,
"roughnessFactor": 0.55
},
"extensions": {
"KHR_materials_ior": {
"ior": 1.45
}
}
}
]
}# USD Preview Surface — UsdShade.MaterialLook prim attributes
# Silicon Carbide (SiC, Carborundum) · finish: metallic
def Material "mat_silicon_carbide" {
token outputs:surface.connect = </mat_silicon_carbide/PreviewSurface.outputs:surface>
def Shader "PreviewSurface" {
uniform token info:id = "UsdPreviewSurface"
color3f inputs:diffuseColor = (0.0116, 0.0116, 0.013)
float inputs:metallic = 0.300
float inputs:roughness = 0.550
float inputs:ior = 1.450
float inputs:opacity = 1.000
float inputs:clearcoat = 0.000
token outputs:surface
}
}
ASTM C1212; Saint-Gobain / Wolfspeed SiC technical literature.
House vocabulary — terms ForMatter uses with intent.
Materials and processes for people who design and make things.
A local-first library of materials, processes, applications, and finishes — equal weight, citable everywhere, with cost-over-volume curves, trade-off profiles, equipment-tier filters, and second-life paths layered onto the data so a student can move from "what is this" toward "what's actually buildable here, now, by me." Part of the renato.design ecosystem — sibling of Plenum, Specimen, Ingenue, gesture, graf, and the Renato Rhino plug-ins. Form and matter, inseparable.
Half of teaching materials is teaching how the material is made into the thing. The standard subscription library was always light on that half. The wedge here isn't better samples or a prettier interface — it's treating Process as a peer entity, not a footnote.
Conway's Material World on raw materials, Lefteri's Making It on processes, Forty's Concrete and Culture, Sparke's Design in Context, Bürdek's Design: History, Theory and Practice of Product Design, Schröpfer's Material Design on materials in architecture, Winchester's The Perfectionists on tolerance, Minshall's Your Life Is Manufactured on the global supply chain, von Busch's Making Trouble on material activism, Were's How Materials Matter, Hegger / Drexler / Zeumer's Basics Materials, Untracht and McCreight on metalsmithing, USDA Forest Products Lab on woods, GIA on gemstones, Schott / CoorsTek / Toray / Owens Corning datasheets, MakeItFrom for verifiable property numbers, ASM Handbook, ISO standards. Museum holdings draw from the Met, MAD, V&A, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Newark Museum of Art, British Museum, Heard Museum, Smithsonian NMAI, Eiteljorg Museum, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Cranbrook Art Museum, and Grand Rapids Art Museum — collection-record permalinks only, designer overview pages and exhibition listings excluded. Voice blocks now ride on every entry kind — material, process, application, and finish — and include Ruskin on iron, Anni Albers on twining, Greg Lynn on the shred-and-teeth NURBS lineage, Pugin on the metal that won't be hammered, Barthes / Yanagi / Benjamin channeled within their philosophy; Sparke, Bürdek, Forty, Conway, Schröpfer, Minshall, von Busch, Lefteri, Pat Pruitt, Mary Lee Hu, Tom Joyce, Albert Paley, and the rest of the contemporary makers quoted verbatim with citation. All cited.
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